A man in China lost nearly £22,000 to a dating scam after getting into a “long-distance relationship” with an AI “girlfriend”, state media reported.
The man, identified by his surname Liu, thought he was in a relationship with a girl called Ms Jiao, who interacted with and sent him pictures and videos online. Little did the man from Shanghai city know that Ms Jiao was merely a fictional character being used to dupe him out of his money.
The scammers used generative artificial intelligence to create the fictional persona of Ms Jiao and then convince Mr Liu that the woman needed money to pay medical bills and fund a business, CCTV News reported. They scammed him out of 200,000 yuan, or about £21,722.
A police investigation revealed that the "scammer team” sent Mr Liu “videos and photos that were all created through AI or made by combining multiple images".
They also created fake medical and reports bills to manipulate the victim into believing his “girlfriend” was in urgent need of financial assistance.
“Throughout the process, Mr Liu never met Ms Jiao in person,” the report noted.
AI scams have become a growing global concern, with criminals exploiting the technology to impersonate real individuals or create entirely fictional personas for financial fraud.
There have been many AI romance scams in recent years wherein perpetrators create highly realistic digital personas to exploit victims emotionally and financially.
In January, scammers stole £6,61,508 from a French woman, 53, after convincing her that she was in a romantic relationship with Hollywood actor Brad Pitt. The scammers used fake messages and AI videos to dupe the woman, leading her to divorce her husband and suffer significant financial loss.
In November last year, a British woman in her 60s was conned out of £19,752 by a scammer posing as a US army colonel named "Mike Murdy" on Tinder. The fraudster used realistic AI videos and images to establish credibility, persuading her to send substantial funds under various pretenses.
In 2023, an Arizona mother reported that scammers had used AI to replicate her daughter's voice in an attempt to extort $1m (£7,90,086) from her.
